The morning light is a liar. It floods our shared courtyard with a golden, peaceful glow that has absolutely nothing to do with the war drum currently beating against my ribs. I’m dressed in ridiculous borrowed golf attire from Amelia—a collared pink polo that’s slightly too big and white shorts that feel obscenely short—standing like a mannequin someone forgot to pose.

“She’s pairing us together,” I say to the empty air, clutching a rental club bag that weighs a thousand pounds. “It’s a foursome. Arthur and Amelia. You and me. It’s mathematically inevitable.”

“Your grasp of basic arithmetic is, as ever, a profound comfort.” Sebastian’s voice comes from his villa door. He steps out, and the liar sunlight does a spectacular number on him. Dark khakis, a simple grey polo that stretches across his chest, hair still damp. He looks like he’s about to endorse a luxury watch, not shank a ball into a water hazard with me. He assesses my outfit with a single, glacial sweep of his eyes. “Pink. A bold choice.”

“It was this or a neon green vest with little whales on it. Amelia’s closet is a cry for help.” I hoist the bag. “She said be at the first tee at nine. It’s eight-fifty. We have to walk together. It’s part of the… itinerary.” The word tastes like dust. I sound like I’m announcing a prison transfer.

Sebastian says nothing, just falls into step beside me as we head down the crushed-shell path toward the course. The silence is a physical thing, swollen with last night’s shirt, with the ocean, with every unspoken thing since Wyoming. I can smell the cut grass, the salt air, and the faint, clean scent of his soap. It’s unfair. “So,” I try, my voice too bright. “Do you even golf? Or is this another one of your quietly competent British skills, like knowing which fork to use during a siege?”

“I played at university. Occasionally. It’s a good walk spoiled, as someone once said.” He glances at me. “You?”

“My athletic career peaked at a middle school production of ‘Grease’ where I had to jump off a bleacher. So, no.” The first tee comes into view, a manicured nightmare of green. Amelia and Arthur are already there, looking annoyingly coupled and serene. Arthur waves with genuine warmth. Amelia gives us a sharp, approving nod, like she’s just successfully merged two hostile corporations.

We reach them. “Excellent, you’re together,” Amelia says, as if she’s orchestrated a moon landing. “Sebastian, you can help her. We’ll do best ball, so it won’t be a total catastrophe.”

“Charming,” I mutter. Sebastian simply takes the bag from my shoulder, his fingers brushing mine. A static shock, or maybe just my nervous system short-circuiting. He pulls out a driver and holds it toward me.

“Ladies first,” he says. His blue eyes are unreadable. “Try not to kill anyone.”

“No promises.” I take the club. It feels alien and dangerous in my hands. I march to the tee box, aware of three sets of eyes on my back. I plant my feet, mimicking what I’ve seen on TV, and give a practice swing that whistles violently through the air. Behind me, I hear Arthur whisper, “Oh, dear.”

Sebastian’s shadow falls across the tee. “You’re holding it like you’re trying to strangle a goose.” Before I can protest, his hands are on mine, repositioning my grip. His touch is clinical, his voice low and close to my ear. “Top hand here. Bottom hand here. Don’t squeeze. It’s a swing, not a vendetta.”

Every nerve ending is on fire. His chest is inches from my back. The heat of him, the scent, the memory of that shirt against my skin last night—it all converges into a single, unbearable point of contact where his fingers cover mine. I stop breathing. The vast, sunny golf course tunnels down to this: the rough texture of the grip, the solid warmth of his hands, the quiet, controlled instruction in my ear. This is the threshold. And for this slow, excruciating moment, we are completely still, poised on the edge of a swing neither of us is ready for.

I turn my head, just an inch. My lips almost brush the stubbled line of his jaw. His breath hitches, a tiny, arrested sound. "I think I got it," I whisper, the words a thread of smoke in the thick air between us.

He goes rigid. Every muscle in the frame pressed against my back locks. It’s like hugging a statue. Then his hands are gone, the warmth and weight of them vanishing so completely it feels like a amputation. He steps back, two precise steps onto the clipped grass. "Right," he says, the single word clipped and frozen. He doesn't look at me. He looks at the fairway, his profile a study in carved marble.

I swing. The club head connects with a dull, satisfying thwack. The ball soars in a decent, arcing line, landing with a polite plop on the edge of the fairway, well short of the water hazard. It’s a minor miracle. Arthur lets out a genuine, "Well done!" Amelia looks faintly surprised. Sebastian says nothing at all. He just moves to the tee, sets up his own ball with terrifying efficiency, and drives it straight down the middle, two hundred yards past mine. The message is clear: Civility. Distance. Performance.

By the time we’re rattling in the golf cart toward our balls, the sun is a brutal, high hammer. My skin feels tight and hot. When we stop, Arthur beams and pulls a small cooler from the back. "Amelia thought we might need hydration!"

I see the bottles—local craft lager, sweating in the ice—and a reckless, giddy relief floods me. A release valve. "Oh, perfect," I announce, my voice too loud. "It's not a game, it's a drinking game. New rule: every bogey is a sip. Every par, a celebratory gulp. Every Sebastian-level perfect drive, a whole damn bottle out of sheer existential despair." I grab one, twist the cap off on the edge of the cart, and take a long, deep pull. The beer is bitter and cold, a lifeline.

Amelia’s brow furrows. "It's nine-thirty in the morning, Imogen."

"It's five o'clock somewhere. Probably this fairway." I take another drink, feeling the cold spread through my chest. I can feel Sebastian's gaze on me now, a tangible pressure. I don't meet it. I focus on the condensation dripping over my fingers, the way the cold bottle feels against my lower lip. I drink to drown the memory of his hands. I drink to dilute the tension coiling in the humid air. I drink because for the next five hours, he is my partner, and this is the only armor I have left.

I turn, the cold bottle dangling from my fingers like a challenge flag. Sebastian is methodically selecting an iron from his bag, his back to me, the muscles in his shoulders shifting under the grey fabric. “Thirsty, Professor?” I ask, my voice laced with a sweetness that could rot teeth. I extend the other sweating bottle toward him. “Or are your hydration needs too impeccably scheduled for a nine-thirty a.m. lager?”

He glances over his shoulder, his blue eyes cutting from the bottle to my face. There’s a flicker there—amusement, annoyance, a crack in the marble. “I’m driving the cart,” he says, his tone flat. “And it’s a five-iron, not a pint glass.”

“Suit yourself. More existential despair for me.” I take another swallow, the bitter chill a counterpoint to the sun baking my shoulders. I watch him set up for his shot, that infuriating, perfect stillness. Arthur is whispering to Amelia near their ball, a private, coupled moment that feels a continent away. The humid air presses down, thick with the smell of damp earth and cut grass and this unbearable, unspoken thing. My skin is alive with it, remembering the map his hands made on mine.

Sebastian’s swing is a study in controlled violence. A crisp *thwack*, the ball a white streak against the blue. It lands on the green, a polite distance from the pin. Of course it does. He straightens, slots the club back into the bag with a quiet click. “Your turn,” he says, finally looking at me. “Try to aim for the same landmass.”

I abandon my beer on the cart seat. My ball sits in the first cut of rough, a little island of rebellion on the emerald perfection. I wrestle the five-iron from my bag. It feels heavier than the driver, more judgmental. I can feel him watching me, a silent, critical audience of one. I swing. The contact is a jarring *thud*. The ball scuttles forward, hopping pathetically onto the fringe of the green, miles from his. A perfect metaphor. I groan. “Well, that was tragically on-brand.”

Sebastian’s lips twitch. Just once. It’s not a smile. It’s a seismic event. “A bogey, at least. Not a catastrophe.” He gets into the driver’s seat of the cart. I slump into the passenger side, grabbing my beer again. The cart jerks forward, and the movement jostles my knee against his thigh. Solid, warm. We both freeze for a fraction of a second before I yank my leg away, taking a hasty gulp. The civility is a thin veneer, and we’re both sanding through it with every quiet minute in this rattling, electric little vehicle.

The game dissolves into a haze of sweating bottles and shifting alliances. I make it my mission, my sole purpose in the sweltering midday heat, to corrupt my sister. “It’s a family tradition,” I lie, pressing a fresh lager into Amelia’s hand after she three-putts. “The Crane women celebrate mediocrity with fermented grains. It’s in our blood. Probably next to the poor life choices.”

“Imogen, I have a seven PM consultation call with a patient in Zurich,” she protests, but her eyes are on Arthur’s retreating back as he and Sebastian march toward a distant green. The sun is a brute. She takes a sip. Then a gulp. “Oh, that is cold.”

By the fourteenth hole, Amelia is giggling at Arthur’s terrible jokes. By the sixteenth, she’s leaning heavily on her putter, declaring the sport “a patriarchal construct designed to sell hideous pants.” I nurse my own bottle, the buzz a familiar, forgiving hum in my veins—a tolerance built on years of backstage parties and existential dread. I’m floating, but the anchor chain of Sebastian’s presence keeps me from drifting away entirely. He watches it all with the detached interest of an anthropologist, speaking only to call out yardage. His silence is louder than my sister’s slurred declamations.

The eighteenth green is a merciful finish. Amelia attempts a celebratory dance and stumbles into a sand trap. Arthur catches her with a fond, exasperated sigh. “Right, darling. I think we’re done.” He easily scoops her into his arms—she’s all sharp angles and limp elegance—and she nuzzles into his neck with a contented sigh. “Sebastian, can you…?” Arthur nods toward me, already turning toward the path to the villas.

“I’m fine,” I announce to the universe, the words coming out with more wind than conviction. I take a step to prove it and the world tilts, the emerald fairway doing a slow, lazy roll. A strong hand closes around my upper arm, steadying me. The touch is electric, a jolt that cuts straight through the beer fog. Sebastian’s fingers are firm, his grip unavoidable. “You’re swaying,” he says, his voice low and close to my ear. The cart is right there. He doesn’t let go as he guides me into the passenger seat, his other hand a brief, searing pressure on the small of my back. The heat of it soaks through the thin polo.

He climbs into the driver’s side, the cart dipping under his weight. The engine whines to life. We are alone, rattling through the twilight-smeared course, the silence now a different creature—softer, more dangerous. The wind is cool on my flushed skin. I let my head loll back against the seat, watching the first stars prick through the violet sky. “I didn’t kill anyone,” I murmur, my eyes closed. “You should be proud.”

“A low bar, but cleared with… characteristic flair.” The cart slows, navigating a turn. I feel his gaze on the side of my face. “You orchestrated that with military precision.”

I open my eyes, turning my head. His profile is etched against the deepening blue, all stern lines and shadow. “Someone had to liven up the proceedings. You were about to start grading our swings.” The cart hits a bump, and my knee knocks into his thigh again. This time, I don’t pull away. The solid warmth of him is the only steady thing in my spinning world. I let it ground me. “Your hands are still on the wheel,” I whisper, the words blurry at the edges. “Very responsible.”

He doesn’t answer. His jaw tightens. His knuckles are pale where they grip the plastic. The cart rolls to a stop in the courtyard between our villas, the engine cutting out. The sudden quiet is a roar. The light from his villa spills across the tiles, painting a golden path to his door. Arthur and Amelia are already gone, vanished into their own suite. It’s just us, the chirping of insects, and a thousand things we’ve spent a year not saying.